The One
by Lynn Wilson
Summary: Basically my take on Animorphs 55. ^_^ AKA a conitinuation of the series.
1. Jake

Insane and reckless, huh? Okay. "Ram the Blade Ship," I gave the order, and ordered myself not to think about the consequences.  
  
"Jake....Little Brother..." Tom looked at me with tears in his eyes, "Thank you..." I glanced around, and controlled the urge to morph, right after I noticed the orange stripes growing on my skin. There was nothing, except my big brother. "You finally killed him....and you didn't kill me, remember, he said he could morph his host, that's what he did, giving me to one of his underlings."  
I gaped, at least I think I gaped. I should be relieved, happy. But I had still killed. I had killed my cousin, what had looked like my brother, 17,000 innocent yeerks.   
"I was so tangled up inside, when I realized that YOU were in charge of the "Andalite Bandits". I wanted to cry and at the same time I wanted to cheer, and warn you of who I was. But then I realized you probably already knew, and a lot of things made sense."  
I stood there, I wanted to cry, I wanted to scream. I wanted to tell him about the phone call. I wanted to tell him I was sorry. I wanted to do everything. I had my brother back. It was what I had worked for the entire war. And he wasn't Tom, any more than I was Jake any more.  
"Where are we?" I finally managed to choke it out. It sounded so unemotional, so inappropriate, but I couldn't make anything else come out.  
"Within The One," Tom, said a mystical quality creeping in to his voice.  
I stared at him, hoping he'd explain and that I wouldn't have to speak again. My mouth was dry and every moment I saw Tom alive in front of me, my throat constricted.  
"The One is impressed by you and wants to meet you. And all of the others. The saviors of Earth." Tom's voice didn't seem like his at all, it was a projection of someone else's voice. "Jake the Yeerk Killer, I want you all to be part of the one, go get Cassie, and then return, return to live as part of the one, with Cassie and Tom."  
My gut shouted at me. I knew this was wrong somehow. I knew the person in front of me was no longer Tom. I felt myself regain composure. Tom who was not Tom, I was used to. "Who are you?" I demanded.  
"Who are you?" the voice within Tom asked back. "We are all within One, and I am the One, and you are the One."  
Oh great, I thought, someone even more cryptic than Crayak and the Ellimist.   
"Where are the others?" I asked.  
"Where are you? They are there...."  
  
An unsettling sensation reverberated through my entire being, not unlike morphing...but with no physical changes. Gradually, I became a red tailed hawk, but not outwardly. I starting seeing with the hawks vision, and think with the hawk's mind, but this hawk's mind was different, human-like. And staring into a bedroom window, stricken with fear. An open bedroom window with a drawer waiting, and a Bic Mac on the window sill. Inside that window a girl sat, a blonde girl, humming to herself and putting together outfits.   
Tobias...Tobias....are you in here... I tried thought-speak, unsure of what had happened, but making a heartrending guess.   
Jake? Where are you? In morph? I can't see you anywhere...I've looked at the entire meadow...not even a cockroach or a rat...but there's...  
Tobias's thought speak was grief ridden. McDonald's I finished softly,and.... My silence said enough. This may sound strange but, Tobias, I think morphed to being you, while you were you.  
Wha...?  
I see the window sill...and that there's nothing in the meadow and I see.....all as if I were inside of you, I saw Tom, alive... Suddenly I felt the pain Tobias must have gone through a thousand times before. I wanted to cry, but hawks don't shed tears. I felt the desire for release, a release that I never realized my friend could never have for more than two hours at a time.  
I'm inside, you, part of you, I don't know how, I don't understand, its the alien who called himself The One, through Ax Tobias and I glared fiercely at the window.   
It's not....I felt Tobias (and my?) head nod toward the open window. She died. The real her, is dead. With that we took to the air and flew into nothingness.  
  
  
Slowly the red tailed vision faded away, a gust of cool nothingness brushed against my molecules. I felt immense joy as my being was swept away. And at the same time, shaded sorrow and regret. I would live, as my molecules joined with others to form something entirely new and different. And yet, I was already dead. Already dead? I gasped, only I couldn't gasp, there was not enough of my physical self left. I tried thought speak again, a very strangled and tense version of thought speak. Rachel?  
Jake.....how did you? Oh...I see....You are lucky, had you known the rules, you too would have to share my fate. But that's okay. It was the alien who sent you. Jake, you're not allowed to Visit the dead. You might see too much, or too little, or not enough. I don't know. But....well....tell Tobias I will love him always...how disgusting was that? And that this is the most joyous thing...ignore the sorrow I....and you....feel lightly. I'm told its normal. Don't worry about me....I think....  
  
  
The Hork-Bajir Valley surrounded me on all sides. The one after the attack. With all of the parents there, bickering, going on and on. This was a bad, bad time in my life, and yet it was the happiest. My mom and dad were together. Things were as peaceful as the could be, in the midst of everything. My Dad was happy. Wait...Marco? I was pretty sure what was going on by now. I felt kind of like I imagined a yeerk might. Feeling Marco's innermost thoughts, Rachel's and Tobias's. But how, how was I going back and forth between my friends? Rachel had said something about Visiting. I knew instinctively that this was important. Or maybe you just pay more attention to your dying cousin.  
"Mmmm...Jake? What are you morphed as this time, cantaloupe? Cockroach? Flea? So close to alliteration there.."  
You Marco.  
"Funny, I don't see another me. I mean someone else with my looks and personality would be impossible to miss."  
You really do feel that way about yourself don't you?  
"Of course."  
Im inside you, not like with the Helmacrons, more like a yeerk-type thing, I feel your thoughts and hear your feelings...and I was with Rachel too, and Tobias and I saw Tom. Its the alien who called himself the one.  
"Oh great. Im sure this a new power you've been given in order to drag you, and consequently me, into another farfetched, impossible war against strange aliens that we hardly know anything about."  
I...uh...really don't know what this about....except, /this/ was the happiest time in your life?  
We shrugged. "One of them, except for the fact that.."  
I was going bonkers I finished for him.  
"Weird."  
I thought we'd seen everything.  
"You know, you really shouldn't challenge fate like that, it'll screw with your head every time. I mean..."  
  
Marco's rambling faded, and I found a jumble within my own head. I was a war-prince now. I was no longer in my brother's shadow. Yet...here he was, in front of me. Ignoring me...unable...unwilling to see how human I'd become? But had he not married a human, as a nothlit? Perhaps he was disappointed in how Andalite I had become...but I was both, human, and Andalite. I finally remembered what had been happening, and was glad for the power of thought-speak once again. And I had thought it was useful before.  
Ax?  
Jake, is that you?   
Something tugged at my brain, but I couldn't place my finger on what. I knew it would snap, eventually. But, would eventually be too late?   
Yes. I seem to be jumping from person to person, as if I'm possessing them, only I have no control over them, I can tell them I'm there, or not...I don't know..."  
This might be some obscure alien technology. It is highly likely. Though I must admit I feel as though I have a Yeerk in my head.  
Yeah, Jake the mighty Yeerk killer getting up close and personal with I stopped myself. This was no time to dwell on all of the horrible things I'd done in the past. Rachel said something about Visiting.  
You were one with Rachel? his thought-speak sounded appalled.  
It was different. I couldn't think of anything else to say. I'm not Marco, I didn't think a joke would be appropriate.  
d o n t tr ust prin ce jake a feeble but triumphant thought pierced into my (our?) head.  
What?  
Nothing Prince Jake, I have been One with the One, and it is a good feeling. Perhaps I shall return to this illusion another time, it seems we have much to discuss.  
The form of Elfangor vanished swiftly into nothingness.  
You have been given a technology by the One, it's called Visiting. In order to activate one must know the exact location of the person they wish to Visit. Which is why I was so surprised that you could Visit one dead, no one knows exactly where that is. Of course The One may be more powerful than it lets on. Perhaps even of the Ellimist's caliber. Perhaps not. In short The One has been sending you to Visit your friends so that you know they are okay, and wished that you would Visit Cassie. He wants us all, to fight for him. His world is in dismay, the Other has been decimating the One with forbidden methods and must be stopped.  
I would have blinked. Had I not been "Visiting" Ax. Marco was right. Another war. I didn't want to...why should I lie even to myself? I wanted to go back, to be in control...to make the decisions. It was all I knew, what I grew up with. But was it my place to get involved in the war of a different species? And would it make me just like the Andalite's to refuse?  
You are thinking under false pretenses, Prince Jake, there is no choice. You will fight for the One.  
I make my own decisions. I wanted to glare at something. But I guess Andalites don't glare much.   
You will have a choice, then.  
  
  
"Mommy, mommy, MOMMY!" I cried, wailed, wrapping my aura around her. Trying to bring her back. Her aura slid silently into mine, and whispered goodbye. I used the tentacles from physical body and grasped my mother's physical self and began slowly to ingest her into my being. I was too young. This war...it had taken all of my family, and now, I just barely 300 would have to take their places within. As soon as final ingestion had commenced, I would have to report to my mother's supervisor. I should have another 1000 cycles at least. But with this war, I didn't know how long before I would be ingested. I didn't even have offspring to ingest me, our line would die out. With me.   
I ignored the physical hunger, and sought my few rations of spiritual nourishment. It was time. I was too young. What had happened to make me deserve this?   
  
  
The nothingness where I met Tom surrounded me once again. "Have you chosen?" The One/Tom asked me.  
Too young. Thrown unprepared into a war she never even wanted. Could I stand by and let that happen to someone else? To many someone else's?  
"I have chosen for myself. But the others must get a choice as well. I will not force them into another war."  
"They will come....all that are able. Now before I meet with all of you, make one more Visit."  
  
  
I smiled at the dirt under my feet. Despite....everything, I still liked the sensation of being dirty and doing a job well. Marriage. Funny...dirt to marriage. Marriage to a different time...with a different boy...no man, Jake never really was a boy. I didn't like getting this way, part of me knew I had to think about these things. Had to put some closure in my life. And the rest me thought I had. I still couldn't help but worry about him...you never do stop caring for someone you love that much. Out there, on a mission, again. Maybe its best for him...maybe marriage is best for me...  
I screamed silently to myself. I didn't want to know Cassie's personal thoughts. I didn't want to Visit her. I couldn't bring myself to announce my presence. To embarrass her with what I'd heard. I choked on silent grief, and I hoped that she would marry. I loved her too much to want to see her unhappy.  
  
  
Tom/The One looked at me. "Well?"  
"Cassie doesn't go." I said flatly.  
"Too bad, you already said that everyone would get to make their own choice."  
I sensed something cold in Tom's voice. And a memory surfaced inside me, Jake is that you? Ax had said to me.  
  
  



	2. Marco

I forgot the disclaimer at the top of Jake's chapter. Oh well. Theyre not mine. I assume you know that. Not making any money here. Enjoy the story.  
-Lynn  
  
  
My name is Marco. Thought you'd heard that for that last time? Well, yeah, I thought I'd said it for the last time, as well. Yet here we all were, well almost all, in Cassie's barn. All of us, being me, Jake, Cassie, Tobias, and Ax. Oh and Tom. Not really a replacement, then again, after the Nora incident, I should realize you can't replace people.  
  
I had been ramming the Blade Ship, what rush that was, I mean, better than a fly morph even. And then I had been back within the Hork-Bajir valley, when my mom and dad were together. I had been whittling. Not too difficult a pastime, honestly. Then Jake had been inside my head. He had said something about Rachel and "Visiting". I shrugged it off. Figured, might as well enjoy a little bit of heaven while I could. Then the Valley had faded away, and Cassie, and her barn had sort of flickered in, in its place. And then, Tobias had flown in, followed by Tom, a rather stricken looking Jake, and Ax.  
  
"So, whose war are we fighting this time?" I asked. Praying that it would be a joke. At the same time, a part of me...hoping.  
  
"Ours. All. The war of the One against the Other."   
  
"Tom, what's wrong with your voice, its all floaty and misty-like. I thought you'd gotten rid of your yeerk."  
  
"He speaks for the One." Jake's glare informed me in no uncertain terms that perhaps my joke was a tad tasteless. I concurred.  
  
"So, I assume, Jake-man, you've already decided to join this blasted thing, and were all here in a rahter stunning imitation of Cassie's barn, in order to decide whether or not were going with you?"  
  
"Pretty much." Jake was still glaring at me. Maybe he just needed someone to glare at. He wouldn't even look in Cassie's direction. Or Tobias's for that matter. I leaned back on a bale of hay, it seemed to me that everything would come full circle in a minute. Or at least we'd get some more information.  
  
"The Other has decimated our planet. The One, is a collective link, like your internet, one step further, of our minds. We are telepathic to a degree, and manipulate the energy in our planet. We are peaceful group, we wish no harm, only to be left alone. The Other, is a group of us who have disbanded from the One, and who are decimating the energy fields which we need to survive. We need you, to Visit those who are part of the Other, and help us to reclaim our energy fields. Our young one starve, while their's prosper. We have learned from the Andalite what you did on Earth, and we beg for your help."  
  
Why can't you Visit yourself? Tobias asked the question we were all thinking. Or at least that's what I was thinking.  
  
"They can shield against us, they know our energy signatures, they don't know those of aliens. You can help us. The Visiting power, along with your ability to morph, you can help us."  
  
I looked around, Jake had already decided. And unfortunately, where Jake went, I went. That point he made about me being bored at home, had /absolutely/ nothing to do with this decision. Tobias was glaring. Fiercly as ever. Maybe because that was all he could do as a hawk. Cassie looked....torn.  
  
"Well, another day, another war. Sound like fun, guys?" The glances I got didn't seem to appreciate me trying to make light of things. "I'm in." I muttered, silently cursing myself. I mean, at home, there was Fame, Fortune, Pretty Girls...and morphing into lobsters out of boredom.  
  
"I.....I'm in," Cassie said softly, tears in her eyes.  
  
"What? No...Cassie...you...you belong, back, at home..." Jake spoke to her, looking studiously at the floor.  
  
"No. I need to be here," the conviction in her voice was pretty strong. I was surprised.  
  
"Why aren't you trying to talk me out of this, huh? I mean, I could die too, wouldn't you care?" Okay, okay, my jokes were definitely losing there touch. But they didn't all have to glare at me in unison.  
  
Count me in. Tobias flew down from the rafters and landed on a different bale of hay.  
  
I will go, if Prince Jake wishes it. Ax said quietly.  
  
"I do, I wish it," Jake said with a strange look in his eyes.  
  
Ax nodded. And Tom looked pleased. And yet I could swear some part of Tom did not look happy at all.  
  
"You have all been given the ability to Visit. Jake is the only in control of where you may or may not Visit. He knows the rules. And the locations he needs to know. He is agreed as your leader, not only by you, but by him. Now it is time for Tom's and your physical bodies to rest. It will take some time to learn how to properly use your energetic forms.  
  
I was in a bed. A nice, soft comfortable feather bed. I could only think of one thing to do. I slept.  
  
"Rise and shine, sleeping ugly," I heard Jake's voice cut through a wonderful dream, involving Britney and Christina.  
  
"Aww...it ws just getting good, too." I mock-glared at Jake.  
  
"I'm going to show you what the Visiting power is like...I have to show everyone, my showing them something familiar. I know from experience, it's impossible to remember who you are the first time you enter an alien, a completely alien mind."  
  
"So serious already? Tch, tch, tch. Jake, you should really have some fun before the war-planning starts."  
  
"I....I....prepare yourself, I'm sending you on a Visit."  
  
It was another beautiful morning. Another morning in which I could open my own eyes. Decide for myself whether or not to stay in bed. Not worry too much about Marco, Marco fighting against me, not knowing what to do. Another morning not wishing for my own son to kill me. Hoping he would tell his father. I remembered Jake talking to me in my head. And then realized where I was. Mom?  
  
"Marco, honey, is that you? What have I told you about using morphs in the house? It still creeps your father out."  
  
Uh...I'm kind of inside of you. It's a power the Kelbrid gave us...they had the blade ship...the stolen ship? They sort of want us to save their planet, kind of like we saved ours.  
  
"Well, now the stolen ship and your disappearance make a little more sense. But Marco, are you kids really going to do this again?" Her voice sounded worried. Like a mother's. Go figure.  
  
We haven't been kids for a long time, Mom. But yeah. We're going to do it again.  
  
"Marco?"  
  
Yes?  
  
"Be careful."  
  
Jake's face formed in front of mine. "Okay. That was even weirder than morphing a cockroach for the first time. It felt kind of like morphing too."  
  
"You don't have to tell the person you Visit that you're there. It's the perfect tool for espionage. You think you understand?"  
"Yeah...I guess so."  
  
"Good, after I show the others, it will be time for a meeting. For now enjoy the Kelbrid technology."  
  
A nintendo, tv and many, many video games flickered into existences. Hey? What else was I supposed to do? 


End file.
